Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1887-02-26

in other States, and we will enter upon an /
era of economy, suppression of crime and !
the decadence of the criminal class.
The gravest error we can make is to APP
ply punishment to children for the wretch
edness of their parents and the misfortune
of birth in an atmosphere of degradation.
Boys and girls of the so-called Grim
inal class, as a rule, are not at heart
bad. no matter what their surroundings;
taken in time and supplied with that
which has been their lacking in their IN
faney-proper influences, control and
training-and % per cent OF them can be
saved to society and made self-respecting,
self-supporting and good citizens-but not
by herding in institutions semi-penal in
character. The State of Michigan, by
actual test, has proven that % per cent. OF
all her dependent children are, in the first
and second years after being taken in
charge, made inmates of private homes,
and become no charge whatever upon the
State, her only duty being that of vista
ton and kindly watch and ward by the
State agents, who care for the per cent.
remaining at Coldwater in the receiving
| institution.
In the face of such 4 showing as that,
shall California continue to manufacture
hoodlums, send children to the State
Prisons and encourage shiftless parents, by
her indiscriminate alIDs-giving, to rid
themselves of their natural charges?
There are in the asylums in California s.
42S half-orphans, abandoned children and
foundlings These are maintained by the
State, and vet the State exercises no sort of
control over the institutions. If a duty
is incumbent upon the State, Its natural
attachment is right. If it is the States
duty to care for dependent children, it is
| her right to do it according to the best and
most economical methods. That she is
doing so now we do not believe any I'M
preiudiced examiner into the matter will
assert. Certain it is, that so long as II
per cent. of the children in our asylums
arc foundiings, TO- per cent. orphans, and
IL per cent. half orphans, there is some
thing so terribly out of joint that it ought
to startle every thoughtful man in the
land. In figures and facts given before the
Senate Committee on Public Morals Thurs
day by the Superintendent of the Boys
and Girls Aid Society, of San Francisco,
are texts that need no sermons to fortify
or explain them. A report of the pro-
ceedings before the committee appeared
IN our columns yesterday, and it
should be read by all people who
take a particle Of concern in State
interests and humanity. The first
report of the State Pathological Commits
sion has been made, and one entire section
is devoted to the subject treated in this
article, exhaustively and with statistical
proofs 1t is burning shame that it must
go out to the world as this report shows
that of our convicts 1884 are cadets in
crime Ninety per cent. of them could
have been saved to society, and State
economy greatly conserved, had California
done her duty to neglected children. She
must at an early day begin to do it. If
the Legislators in Sacramento to-day so
will it, she can begin tomorrow; enter
upon the system of compelling kindred to
care for the half orphans; take them off
the shoulders of the State as mere de-
pendents; remove the stigma of the semi
penal institution at San Francisco; refuse
to longer sit by until the child commits
crime and then act only to brand it ; but
on the contrary prevent it drifting into the
current of chronic criminal courses, save
it to the State-in short, proceed upon the
oil worn and eternal truth, that an ounce
Of prevention is worth a pound of cure.
In other words, in the language of the
Pathological Commission, IF it is well to
reform the child who has taken one false
step, how much more important is it to
prevent it from becoming foe to society"